Page:Bacons Essays 1908 West.djvu/176

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
153
OF FACTION
[ESSAY LI

memory; If he Conferre[1] little, he had need have a Present[2] Wit; And if he Reade litle, he had need have much Cunning[3], to seeme to know that[4] he doth not. Histories make Men Wise; Poets Witty[5]; The Mathematicks Subtill; Naturall Philosophy deepe; Morall Grave[6]; Logick and Rhetorick Able to Contend. Abeunt studia in Mores[7]. Nay, there is no Stond[8] or Impediment in the Wit[9] but may be wrought out[10] by Fit Studies; Like as Diseases of the Body may have Appropriate Exercises. Bowling[11] is good for the Stone and Reines; Shooting[12] for the Lungs and Breast; Gentle Walking for the Stomacke; Riding for the Head; And the like. So if a Man's Wit be Wandring, let him Study the Mathematicks; For in Demonstrations, if his Wit be called away never so little, he must begin again: If his Wit be not Apt to distinguish or find differences, let him Study the Schoole-men; For they are Cymini sectores[13]. If he be not Apt to beat over Matters[14], and to call up one Thing to Prove and Illustrate another, let him Study the Lawyers' Cases: So every Defect of the Minde may have a Speciall Receit[15].

LI

OF FACTION

Many have an Opinion not wise, That for a Prince to Governe his Estate[16], Or for a Great Person to governe his Proceedings, according to the Respect of Factions[17], is a Principall Part of Policy: whereas contrariwise, the Chiefest Wisdome is, either in Ordering[18] those Things, which are


  1. converse
  2. ready
  3. ingenuity
  4. that which
  5. imaginative
  6. moral philosophy serious
  7. One's studies pass into one's character.
  8. obstacle
  9. mind
  10. worked out, removed
  11. playing bowls
  12. archery
  13. hair-splitters (lit. carvers of cummin seeds)
  14. ready in passing from one subject to another
  15. prescription for its remedy
  16. state
  17. with a view to the interests of particular parties
  18. in regulating